Fintech invades Product Hunt Toronto #8 — Event Recap
The Fintech Revolution
“If you told me 10 years ago people would willingly pay money and give up their precious time on a Thursday evening to talk about finance and technology, I would have laughed at you,” — Michael Garrity.
Last week we gathered a roomful of 250 people — thought leaders, makers and early adopters — for a night dedicated to the future of Fintech. Fuelled by pizza, we discovered local products, met great people and had a wonderful time.
Here is how the night went. We kicked it off with an amazing lightning talk from William Mougayar to set the tone about 5 reasons why Fintech is everyone’s bank. Check it out here.
Next up was arguably one of the most entertaining Fintech keynote presentations by the CEO and Co-Founder of Financeit, Michael Garrity. Michael shared with us formative moments in his Fintech career, lessons learned along the way and gave a great overview of the Canadian Fintech landscape. You can check out his presentation here.
Take something complex and make it simple and fast — Michael Garrity
Demos
We had 3 fantastic companies demonstrate disruptive technologies solidifying why Toronto is a hotbed for FinTech and groundbreaking innovation.
Borrowell
Borrowell offers affordable, fixed-interest loans giving Canadians a smarter way to manage their debt. Their online platform is ideal for Canadians with good credit scores who want better alternatives to high interest rates on credit cards.
Plooto
Plooto is a payment management platform for business payments. It automates and streamlines the way companies pay one another.
Street Contxt
Street Contxt is an intelligent information marketplace built for global Capital Markets. The team they’ve assembled are reinventing the way market-moving commentary is produced, consumed, and discovered across “the street” (Wall Street). The platform provides smart and actionable insights that allow its users access to personalized information that helps to drive their business.
#ProductBrag: 10 seconds to brag about your Fintech product
At Product Hunt Toronto we see a lot of great new products. Unfortunately, we don’t have time to showcase all of them, so we decided to extend an opportunity by inviting anyone working on a Fintech related project in the crowd to come up and do rapid-fire product pitches. Here are a few of them!
FundThrough
FundThrough is an online lender that helps SMBs that sell to larger, established customers eliminate cash flow hurdles on their path to growth. FundThrough does this by allowing them to get their outstanding invoices paid in as little as 24 hrs instead of waiting 30+ days.
X-Factor: FundThrough is able to lend where banks cannot because they lend on the strength of your customers’ credit, not your business. “There are no limits to how much you can borrow, if you’ve invoiced it, we can fund it.”
Fun Fact: They have a mural of a city called Entrepreneurville painted on the main wall in their office. It has cars, trains, trucks, people, buildings mountains and even a hot air balloon flying overhead. It’s pretty cool.
Gifting Sense
Gifting Sense is an online service designed to help parents teach their children to think before they buy. In about 2 minutes, using two of three on-screen calculators, kids can answer (on their phone) all the questions their parents would normally want addressed before agreeing to spend money. Their “Gift Surveys” offer a quick burst of just-in-time financial education that builds and lasts because it occurs every time purchases are being considered.
Rubix by Deloitte
Rubix platform is an enterprise-ready blockchain environment designed to run and manage customized blockchain applications. As Rubix clients shift from ideation to requiring a functioning proof of concept, the team combines their strategy, engineering, and blockchain expertise to create applications that solve specific business needs, all while leveraging a platform specifically designed with enterprise user specifications in mind.
X-Factor: They bring to the table a technology platform (custom blockchain deployment, smart contract development, key metrics dashboard, and other developer tools), as well as an experienced tech team (platform engineers, prototype developers, and Deloitte domain expertise).
Fun Fact: They have fiery lunch table debates covering topics from adult coloring books, Groundhog Day (the movie), A.I. and today’s topic: Michelangelo.
Panel Discussion
We closed the night out with a fantastic panel discussion led by Daryna Kulya. Topics varied from building an MVP, validating it with customers, to opportunities in Fintech and personal favorite products.
What’s Next?
Product Hunt Toronto will return with another awesome event soon. Are you building a great product that you’d like to showcase? If so, apply here.
We will announce more details soon, but for now stay in touch with us via our mailing list, Twitter, and Facebook.
Want to see more photos from our event? Facebook is the place to go. While you’re there, hit “Like”. We like you a lot, too. ❤
Have feedback, comments, questions? Want to sponsor our events? Email info@producthunttoronto.com or sponsors@producthunttoronto.com. We’re always listening!
Special thanks to the entire Product Hunt Toronto team and everyone for making it possible! See you at the next one!
Written by JJ Tang
Edits by Daryna Kulya
Cover image by Preet Singh
Photos by Brian Simon